Concessions line an entryway to Istanbul's fabled Grand Bazaar. Some 2,600 merchants compete in the covered and open-air sections, and haggling, of course, is part of the game.

Written by

Si Liberman
| Special to the Daily Record

Days before our ship, the MSC Divina, docked in Istanbul there had been anti-American demonstrations in the city and elsewhere in the country. A State Department memo cautioned American visitors to beware.

As fate would have it on the very day of our arrival, Oct. 3, five persons were killed by Syrian forces' gunfire in a Turkish border town, touching off cries for revenge and adding fuel to the Mideast tinderbox.